Surging Chippewas Head to Illinois State
1/30/2015 12:00:00 AM | Gymnastics
By Andy Sneddon, CMUChippewas.com
MOUNT PLEASANT, Mich. - Still a long way to go in the season, still plenty out there in terms of goals.
The Central Michigan gymnastics team posted a 196.175 in winning last weekend at Ball State. The number continued the trend of meet-to-meet improvement, and it put the Chippewas north of the watershed 196 mark, adding fuel to their ever-burgeoning confidence.
CMU will partake Saturday in the Illinois vs. Michigan Classic, an annual four-team event featuring CMU, Eastern Michigan, Illinois-Chicago and this year's host, Illinois State.
"I think this is going to be a really good indicator of where we're at," CMU coach Jerry Reighard said. "Can we break that 196 barrier again? That has been a team goal and certainly that has been what we've been pushing for."
It marks the second time that CMU (4-1) will square off in an event with Eastern Michigan (3-1). The Chippewas defeated the Eagles in a tri-meet (with Seattle Pacific) two weeks ago at McGuirk Arena.
Saturday's meet does not count in the Mid-American Conference standings, but that doesn't make it any less important, Reighard said.
"I know that it's going to be a real battle between Eastern and us," said Reighard, whose team finished 1.3 points better, a relatively comfortable margin, the first time it saw the Eagles. "If Eastern beats us, that will give them momentum that we certainly don't want them to have and so that'll be the primary team that we're focusing on."
EMU posted a season-best 195.250 team score in a win over Bowling Green last weekend. The season-best scores for Illinois-Chicago and Illinois State are 191.375 and 188.600, respectively.
For Reighard and the Chippewas, the focus, as always, is on their performance, not the opponent's. CMU posted season-best team numbers on vault, bars and floor exercise against Ball State a week ago, and won or shared the top spot in all four rotations.
"We're pushing really hard," Reighard said. "Neither the team nor the coaching staff was 100 percent satisfied with the performances."
A major goal is earn a 9.8 from both judges in any rotation, Reighard said. If that happens, the minimum score a Chippewa would earn is 9.8, and Reighard would happily take that kind of consistency which would put the Chippewas over 196 for a given meet.
"Our is to convince both judges that we're 9.8, and that improves our team score," he said. "So I kind of put the challenge out, and it's little nuggets at a time and quarter-10ths at a time. We're still feeling around for what our real lineup is going to be.
"We're feeling a little bit like we can't miss, the confidence level is getting to that point. It'll be a really good test: Are you there or aren't you there? Can you guarantee you're going to be in the zone and hit a routine?"